


the subjective nature of perfection

by jdphoenix



Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, F/M, Grant Ward Redemption, Pregnancy, Season/Series 04, Unreliable Narrator
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-25
Updated: 2020-12-25
Packaged: 2021-03-10 16:48:34
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,481
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28320402
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jdphoenix/pseuds/jdphoenix
Summary: The Framework is supposed to be a "better world."As far as Daisy's concerned, it leaves a lot to be desired.
Relationships: Jemma Simmons/Grant Ward
Comments: 7
Kudos: 75





	the subjective nature of perfection

**Author's Note:**

  * For [shineyma](https://archiveofourown.org/users/shineyma/gifts).



> This is a Christmas gift for the lovely shineyma. Hope you have a merry holday, hon. <3

Two seconds in and the Framework already sucks.

“Owwwwww,” Daisy whines from where she’s woken up on hard concrete at the bottom of an equally hard set of front steps. Her hip and her shoulder and her elbow on her left side all sting, she’s guessing from the fall she took when her real world brain took over for her NPC Framework self.

Behind and above her, she hears a door opening. She tries to speed up the whole getting up process, but there’s no way whoever lives here isn’t gonna get to see her like this.

“Oh, jeez. Skye? Are you okay?”

Daisy’s efforts take a hard 180 and her butt lands back on the bottom step. Because rushing down the stairs to help her is a very concerned looking Ward.

Just the sight of him—just the _sound_ of his _voice—_ ramps up her embarrassment until she’s well and truly pissed. Of course he’s here. He’s _always_ there.

(Obviously he was gonna be here _somewhere_ , she just didn’t think he’d be the _first person_ she saw.)

Somehow—Daisy’s not quite sure how, seeing as she was swayed at the time—Coulson got it in his head the prisoner he brought back from Maveth was the perfect person to help fight Hive. The others have all gotten used to him in the months since, but between Hive and the aftermath, Daisy just hasn’t been around to adapt to seeing Ward’s face every goddamn day.

Not that she wants to. She could very happily live her whole life with no idea _how_ the others have put up with him for so long.

“You think you can stand?” This Ward isn’t like the Ward she’s still not used to. That one would probably be laughing while he took photos on his phone. This one seems more like the fake version who pretended to be her friend.

That reminder has her scrambling to her feet just so she can pull her arm out of his helpful hands. “Yeah, yeah, I’m fine.”

If he notices her bitter tone, he doesn’t let on. “Good. We’ve already got one invalid around here, we don’t need another.”

That’s more like it. Laughing about the injured is _exactly_ the sort of thing she’d expect from Ward.

“Come on. If we keep her waiting much longer, she’ll try to escape.”

He obviously expects her to follow and she figures if it’s what NPC Daisy would do, she’d better do it—at least for now. No way is she helping Ward torture someone, even if they are only computer code.

The foyer they step into is pale wood and kitschy decorations. In her hurry to keep up, Daisy barely has time to glimpse a wedding photo and a collection of dog figurines on the way to the kitchen. There, Ward is filling a mug with liquid from a kettle—she’s guessing it’s either for him or it’s to pour on his victim. Or both.

“Thanks for covering me on the Ramirez case,” he says while he stirs. “I know I should be more on the ball. It’s just-” He looks up like he thinks he can see through the ceiling. “Things have been kinda tight around here, you know?”

Since she has no idea what he’s talking about, she figures the most reasonable answer is, “I know.”

He smiles thinly at her over the mug and takes a sip. His nose crinkles in a way she would’ve thought was cute four years ago. “Perfect,” he coughs and takes a quick swig of a mug left on the table.

He tips his head towards the stairs and, not having any idea where to go, she gestures for him to go first. Again, if he thinks she’s acting weird, he doesn’t let on.

That’s the problem with Ward. Even if he is seeing through her act, she’ll never know until it’s too late. She’ll have to ditch him as soon as possible.

As they mount the stairs, Daisy can hear a dog barking a warning. Clearly not one about them because his barks grow excited when he sees Ward coming.

“It’s all right, Buddy. Settle down.” Ward heads straight for the open doorway at the back of the hall, scratching the dog’s head when he draws even with him. The big, dumb thing pants while his tail whips back and forth against a dresser. The books on top wobble between their dog book ends.

Ward’s warm tone fades when he looks up at the room’s other occupant, someone out of Daisy’s line of sight as she’s still lingering in the hall. “What do you think you’re doing?”

Expecting some violence is about to happen, Daisy hurries forward, hoping to put a stop to it somehow.

“I-I was just going to stretch my legs-”

Daisy has to catch herself on the doorway because otherwise she might fall right over at the sight of _Simmons_.

“You know what the doctor said.” Ward pushes Simmons back into bed. Not that it looks like she ever left. She’s so pregnant she needs Ward’s help just to get her legs up on the mattress. “No going anywhere without supervision.”

Simmons’ forehead is creased like she’s trying to figure out who this is and what he’s doing wearing Ward’s face. “I’m not a child.”

“No, but you’re carrying one.” Ward lays his hand over her stomach, smiling in a way that is so _not_ Ward it throws Daisy for another loop before she’s even recovered from the last one. (Bastard.) “So wait for me next time, all right?”

“All right.” Simmons is doing a great job here. She’s all softness and gratitude. If it weren’t for the hitch in her voice, Daisy would worry she’s somehow still the NPC. She doesn’t even push Ward’s hand off—which is exactly what Daisy would do if she was her, mission be damned—she actually covers it with hers like she _likes_ him touching her.

Which brings up a whole other issue because on Simmons’ hand is a ring. A big ol’ sparkly one that can only mean one thing.

“And, hey, someone stopped by to check on you.”

A lot of emotions fly across Simmons’ face when Ward moves so she can see Daisy in the doorway. Shock, relief, and just enough guilt to remind Daisy that once upon a time Simmons had a crush on Ward.

All these months he’s been hanging around the Playground, forcing the team to put up with his disgusting face, who knows what he’s been doing to worm his way back in? And with Simmons vulnerable after all the crap Hive put her through? Suddenly Daisy’s wondering if maybe there’s more than grief over an ex keeping Simmons from finally making a move with Fitz.

“Hi, how’re you feeling?” Daisy moves in quick, before Simmons can do something stupid like call her by her name.

“As well as can be expected, I suppose.” Simmons pats her belly and raises her eyebrows in a classic _I just plugged into a virtual reality where I’m preggers_ look.

Daisy responds in kind with a _no kidding_.

“And, hey, I’m not just here for her.” She pastes on a smile and turns to Ward. “I’m betting someone needs a break.”

“No, that’s-”

“Seriously. I make a great guard dog. And you can’t tell me you’ve showered since you brought her home.” As she doesn’t actually know any of the details around Simmons being on bedrest, it’s a gamble.

But it pays off. The fight goes out of Ward and he lets out a self-depricating laugh.

“That obvious, huh?” He glances down to the dog sitting patiently at his feet. “And I guess this guard dog is overdue for a walk.”

Immediately the tail starts slamming into the dresser again.

Ward chuckles. It’s an annoyingly warm sound. “All right, boy. Just a sec.” He looks to Simmons. “I’ll just take him around the block.”

“Twice,” Simmons says. “At least. He deserves it.” Nice job, Simmons.

All it takes is that little push and in a few minutes Ward’s changed into his workout clothes and is taking the dog out for an extended walk. Daisy joins Simmons on the bed, sitting patiently on the edge by her legs until she hears the door downstairs close.

“Oh my _God_.”

Simmons closes her eyes in horror. “I know.”

“You’re _married to Ward._ You’re _carrying his spawn_.”

“ _Daisy!_ ”

“What? I’m just saying, this ‘perfect world’ the LMDs talked about is clearly not so much.”

When the Coulsonbot told her this was a better world, she assumed there’d be no Hydra and Inhumans would be living openly as accepted members of society. And yeah, that could all be the case, but she doesn’t see how _Simmons having Ward’s baby_ is part of any better reality.

(Now if she was having _Fitz’s_ baby…)

This place is definitely not as advertised is all she’s saying.

“You don’t know that,” Simmons says softly enough Daisy almost doesn’t hear her. She’s also touching her stomach in kind of a concerning way.

“What was that?”

Simmons sighs heavily and the way she’s _not_ looking at Daisy tells her more than anything she actually says. “‘Perfect’ is a relative term. What’s perfect for you, for example, would certainly not be perfect for Senator Nadeer.”

“So-” Daisy wracks her brain, but still comes up empty. “What? You’re saying that this-” she gestures around them at the quaint little suburban house and the baby names book on the nightstand and the _wedding rings_ \- “is someone’s idea of perfect?”

Simmons turns the ring around her finger. “Maybe.”

For a minute, Daisy can’t respond. She’s too busy looking at Simmons. _Really_ looking at her. For the first time since Coulson dragged her back. Maybe for the first time since Fitz dragged Simmons back from Maveth.

And sure, this isn’t the real Simmons. This body _definitely_ isn’t hers. But the face is. The actions are. And they say a whole helluva lot.

“Simmons? Is this _your_ idea of perfect?”

She looks frustrated. “I don’t know. Maybe?”

Aw crap. Now she looks guilty. For maybe wanting what a million other people want.

Daisy is officially the worst friend.

Simmons sighs. “On Maveth, it was … nice. To have Will. To be with him. The domesticity. It was good. And when I ho- when I _thought_ we might still be able to save him, I let myself dream about having that on Earth. They were good dreams.”

Daisy reaches out to take her hand. “I’m sure they were.”

And Simmons smiles and just like that all is forgiven.

Of course Daisy still feels like crap, but she’ll make it up to her somehow. In fact, she could probably start right now…

“But you know you could have that, right? Not with- Well, obviously not. But if you gave Fitz a chance he’d start looking at houses in a heartbeat.” She laughs the end of it because Fitz would so pop the question on the first date if Simmons said she wanted to jump straight to the happily ever after.

“Daisy.”

Simmons sounds so not-laugh-y that Daisy’s humor fades before she even sees the look on her face. The really serious one. The one that’s just a little bit like her _I know I’m a genius but do the rest of you even have_ _ **brains**_ look. And just a little sad too.

“Oh.” Daisy’s hand flies to her mouth. It’s the kind of thing that always happens in movies and she always thought was totally contrived but in the moment she gets why people do it. It’s for when you can’t bear to say what you’ve just realized, when you don’t even want to _breathe_ and let time keep moving forward into a reality that’s completely different from the one you were living in a moment ago. But she has to breathe and she has to say it. She owes Simmons that when she’s spent so long saying the opposite.

“You don’t love Fitz.”

It feels almost blasphemous to say, like she just cursed in church or something.

But she can see in Simmons’ face that it’s true.

“I do,” Simmons says. “But not the way he wants.”

That is going to _kill_ Fitz—assuming he hasn’t already figured it out. And it kills Daisy a little bit too, if she’s honest. She wanted her friends to be happy. It just seemed so natural that they’d be happy _together_.

“Are you sure?” she asks, the words spilling out before she can help herself. “I mean, you haven’t even tried-”

Simmons is already shaking her head. “No. And I don’t need to. I know my own feelings, Daisy.”

And she should respect that. Simmons is at least nice enough not to say it.

“Okay. Well.” Daisy swallows down everything she’s feeling. There’ll be time to deal with it later. And if there isn’t, then that’s fine too. She’d really rather not. “Now that that serious and definitely necessary to the mission talk is over with, what are we gonna do about this?”

Simmons looks down at her stomach. “I have no idea.”

01100010011000010110001001111001 

It seems to take forever for things to settle down after the team is recovered. There’s Aida—in a newly fashioned Inhuman body—to imprison, Talbot to reassure, Mack to see hooked up to life support since he’s chosen not to return with the rest of them. It’s after Jemma’s done this and promised Elena they’ll do everything they can to get him back that she finally has a moment of privacy.

Or she thinks she does, at least. After stepping out of the Zephyr’s infirmary and taking a deep, _deep_ breath, she discovers there’s someone loitering in the hall.

“Tired?” Grant asks.

“Exhausted,” she says, letting her tone say exactly how much.

He lifts an arm, inviting her to come into his side. She does without hesitation, letting him take some of her weight and usher her into the nearest storage pod.

“How are you feeling?” he asks once he has her sitting on one of the crates inside. He tips her face up, looking into her eyes. “Everything … okay?” His hands explore her jaw and neck, traveling down her arms and brushing against her—much flatter than it was in the Framework—stomach.

“Yes. I checked the heartbeat while Daisy was checking Mack’s connection to the Framework,” she says even as her own pulse spikes. “The baby’s fine.”

An unnoticed tension goes out of Grant. Her reassurance seems to break down some barrier between them and he rests his palms against her stomach.

“I was so worried.”

Such a confession is telling for a man who survives by hiding all trace of weakness.

But that doesn’t mean it’s honest.

“Why?” she asks even as she slides her hand over his. “Because of the Framework?” Fitz has already proven that those who were subjected to the program retain some vestige of their false selves.

Grant stiffens and for a moment he looks almost angry—though not at her. “No. That was- I don’t know what the hell that was.” He steps closer, close enough she can feel his warmth. She sits up a little straighter, wanting every bit of it she can get. “When I realized I was gonna be taken, that I’d fucked up that badly, all I thought about was that we never got to finish our conversation. Because I was an idiot.”

“Grant-”

“I was.”

She laughs. “I wasn’t going to argue the point.” He is a truly spectacular idiot at times. Often, in fact. She sometimes thinks that his brain spends so much of its sense keeping him alive when it most matters that it doesn’t have any left for normal human interaction. “But I was going to say it isn’t entirely your fault we were interrupted. It was as much my decision as yours to keep this between us.”

By _this_ , she doesn’t just mean her pregnancy, she means everything leading up to it as well.

That conversation she had with Daisy in the Framework was long overdue and one she should have had with the rest of the team long ago—Fitz especially. They’re all so convinced that the two of them are perfect for one another, Jemma just doesn’t know how to tell them otherwise. And if they were to learn, in addition, that she knew she wasn’t in love with Fitz because she was in love with _Grant—_ well, the fallout would put the mess the LMDs made of the Playground to shame.

Perhaps if she’d been more open with them in the wake of Will’s death and allowed them to see what she was going through, they would have then been able to see her relationship with Grant develop and mature into what it is today. But of course, if she had been more open with them then, it’s unlikely there would _be_ a relationship now. She and Grant bonded first over their similar heartbreaks and were able to confide in one another as a direct result of there being no other sympathetic ears available.

“Fair enough,” Grant says. “But it doesn’t change the fact that when I thought I was never coming home again, the home I was thinking of was you.”

Jemma’s heart flutters in her chest and her eyes begin to sting.

“And,” he adds, his own voice gone somewhat rough, “whoever this is.” The heel of his hand presses somewhat more firmly against her stomach, allowing him to feel the slight swell hidden beneath her sweater.

Before the Framework and the LMDs, the way she left things with Grant was uncertain at best. The private moment she’d found to tell him about her pregnancy was interrupted by news of the Russian’s hideout and he never gave her any sign of how he might have felt. In fact, he avoided so much as _looking_ at her for that entire mission.

So when she woke up in the Framework to find herself very pregnant and being doted on by a version of him that was so obviously invested, she couldn’t help but hope.

It’s not something she’s allowed herself to do much of lately and the fear it might turn out the way her past hopes have has been a weight on her chest.

She leans forward, her eyes shut and trusting Grant to catch her. He does, cradling her against his shoulder. She breathes deep, drinking in the scent of him. It was different in the Framework. He didn’t have that particular scent that is _Grant_. But he still held her this gently.

For a long while they simply remain like that, holding one another and savoring their mutual understanding.

Eventually, however, he pushes her up so that she’s looking at him when he says, “Talbot is still here.” For a moment the utterly unromantic statement throws her, until he follows it up with, “He has medics.”

Ah. Of course. He knows she could never live with herself if she left a member of the team in need of medical attention.

She rests her palm against his cheek, feeling the stubble left by his time as a prisoner of the Framework. “Are you asking me to run away with you?”

“No.”

Again she’s thrown, until he produces a slim golden band.

“I’m asking you to marry me. Again.”

She stares. Unless he stole it from somewhere—always a possibility with him—he had to have bought it ages ago. And he wouldn’t have had many opportunities to do so, not when he’s still technically on probation and under careful watch whenever not on base. Even as her mind is sifting through potential occasions he might have slipped away mid-mission, she says, “You know I don’t remember the other proposal, but I do hope it was a bit more romantic than a cramped storage pod.”

“What? You don’t think this is romantic?” He points to the ceiling. “This is some premium mood lighting. You don’t get this on a picturesque beach.”

“No?”

“No way. And all that sand?”

“What’s wrong with sand?”

He rolls his eyes like it should be obvious. “The wind kicks it up, it gets in your eyes, your clothes. It definitely makes the next part uncomfortable.”

“The next part?” she asks, well aware as he bends over her on the crate precisely what the next part entails and why sand would make it difficult.

“This part,” he says and begins kissing his way down her neck.

She attempts to say something about this being how they got in this mess in the first place, but suspects she botches it up as she also tries to tell him he’d better not drop her ring.

The ring does make it on her finger though, so she must make at least a little sense.


End file.
